.NGUAGE TEACHING 
IN THE GRADES 



BY 



ALICE WOODWORTH COOLEY 

Assistant Professor in the Department of Education, 
University of North Dakota, Formerly Super- 
visor of Primary Instruction in the Public 
Schools of Minneapolis, Minnesota. 




HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & COMPANY 
BOSTON NEW YORK 

CHICAGO 




^Aw*.^, /^^?>r ^ PUBLISHERS' NOTE. 

This paper on Language Teaching in the Grades has been 
prepared by Mrs. Coolej at our request, and is published for 
distribution among superintendents and teachers who are 
especially interested in that branch of school work. 

Mrs. Cooley is a practical as well as a theoretical believer 
in the use of literature as an essential element of vital lan- 
guage teaching, and has had exceptional opportunity, as Su- 
pervisor of Primary Work in the Minneapolis Public Schools, 
to plan and organize a language course based on such use, and 
to observe its working. The excellent results achieved in those 
schools aroused a very general interest in her theories and 
methods, and requests for papers on the subject came to her 
from important educational associations. In compliance with 
such requests papers were prepared and presented at the 
general session of the National Educational Association at 
Charleston in 1900, at the meeting of the Minnesota State 
Educational Association at St. Paul in 1902, at the meeting 
of the Department of Superintendence of the N. E. A. at 
Cincinnati in 1903, and at the Summer School of the South 
at Knoxville in 1904. The papers read before the two Na- 
tional Associations will be found in the published proceedings 
of those meetings. 

The papers presented at educational meetings were largely 
devoted to the discussion of the general principles of lan- 
guage training. Excerpts from one or more of them appear 
in the present paper, but i£ kas been planned to treat here 
the real problems which naflst be worked out in actual ex- 
perience. Its object will be accomplished if it affords help- 
ful suggestion to the superintendents and teachers who are 
now working out those problems in their own schools. 

Houghton, Mifflin & Co. 

Copyright, 1905, Houghton, Mifflin <fe Co. 



LANGUAGE TEACHING IN THE GRADES. 

The speech of one who talks much and says little 
is but *' as sounding brass and a tinkling cymbal," 
though every word be correctly used and every 
sentence faultless in construction. Fluency and 
precision of speech may be gained at the expense 
of language power. It clearly follows that instruct- 
ing children in the use of language forms is not the 
vital part of language teaching. True language 
training is giving skill in self-expression : the ex- 
pression of the individual's own experiences, — his 
own thoughts, his own feelings, his own way of 
looking at things ; skill in expressing them in 
terms of simplicity, sincerity, and effectiveness. 

To teach language is to rouse, stimulate, and 
guide twofold activity in the pupil : (1) thinhing; 
(2) giving his thought to others. 

The natural stimulus of every phase of human 
activity is the ideal that takes hold of the mind 
and heart : and the effectiveness of that activity in 
each individual depends upon the strength of his 
purpose and the degree of effort he puts forth; 
these in turn depend upon the vividness and potency 
of the stimulating idea. The word ideal means 



2 LANGUAGE TEACHING IN THE GRADES 

idea plus desire to attain — the prerequisites of 
all real attainment. The teacher of language, 
therefore, should: (1) present ideals — stir the 
thought and feeling which generate the desire to 
express ; and (2) provide for and guide the prac- 
tice in striving to reach these ideals. 

In the study of any art, response to truth and 
beauty must always precede and accompany suc- 
cessful efforts to attain truthful and beautiful ex- 
pression. Teachers of music, of drawing, and of 
painting, build on this principle. Why should 
there be divorce of practice from ideals in this one 
great universal art of language? To be sure, there 
is no skill without repeated doing ; but it is equally 
certain that the product of low ideals and weak 
thought is valueless, be it ever so perfect mechan- 
ically. One must constantly put forth his own 
efforts, but he must as constantly look to his ideals. 
George Eliot voiced what every human being 
feels when she said, — " For my part, people who 
do anything finely always inspire me to try. I 
don't mean that they make me believe that I can 
do it as well as they, but they make the things 
seem worthy to be done." 

Whatever art is studied, two fundamental prin- 
ciples must be recognized : (1) that the subtle 
influence of vital contact with the best expressions 
of that art moulds the student's efforts into finer 



THE NATURAL BASIS 3 

quality and form ; (2) that his own striving to 
express himself enables him to attain better appre- 
ciation of the work of the artist. Literature is the 
highest form of expression of the language arts ; 
and the right use of the right literature is, there- 
fore, the basis of all really effective and vital lan- 
guage teaching. 

This use of literature is not as a setting of the 
copy. A necessary element of art is that it shall 
be an expression of the individual's own way of 
seeing, feeling, and doing ; and this means neither 
imitation nor reproduction. A great poem should 
never be paraphrased. A story in verse, not a 
poem, may be rewritten in prose form ; and a real 
poem or a bit of fine prose may be copied for 
various purposes related to vocabulary or standards 
of form ; but literature as the natural basis of lan- 
guage lessons serves a far greater end. It should 
suggest and recall, illumine and interpret, the 
child's own personal experiences, which he is later 
to tell in speech or in writing as expressing him- 
self. He does, truly, "enjoy in his books a de- 
lightful dress-rehearsal of experience;" but it 
must not be forgotten that it is his own personal 
experience which is dressed for the rehearsal. 

The first essential of success in teaching English 
is this large conception in the teacher's mind of 
the value and significance of the work. If he con- 



4 LANGUAGE TEACHING IN THE GRADES 

ceives it to be merely instruction in the use of 
language forms, the result will inevitably bear the 
stamp of the mechanical. If, on the other hand, 
his conscious purpose is to enlarge and deepen the 
thought and feeling to be expressed, and at the 
same time to develop technical accuracy, skill, and 
worthier form, the result will be vital. 

And this large conception must be in the heart 
as well as in the mind of the teacher. Scientific 
observation has proved that all mental growth be- 
yond a certain rudimentary stage depends abso- 
lutely on self -expression — on finding fit utterance 
for the vague thought or feeling that cannot take 
shape or body until in language it comes to birth. 
But it is possible to know the recorded scientific 
fact without realizing its importance or bearing. 
Only when the feeling which accompanies such 
realization is woven into the fibre of this intellec- 
tual knowledge is its dynamic force felt in language 
teaching. The story of Hellen Keller's life im- 
presses the feeling of the value of open avenues of 
expression, more forcibly than can any statement 
of scientist or philosopher. Her life is itself a 
book in which God has so written this great truth 
that it makes powerful appeal to the heart of the 
reader as well as to his intellect. 

Again, the conception of the teacher's part in 
this development of language power will determine 



THE TEACHER'S PART 6 

the character of the teaching. We pour new life- 
currents into our work when we not merely know 
as a fact, but assimilate as a truth the thought of 
Carlyle : " How can an inanimate, mechanical, 
gerund-grinder foster the growth of anything ; 
much more of mind, which grows not like the vege- 
table (by having its roots littered by etymological 
compost), but like a Spirit, — by mysterious con- 
tact of Spirit." Helen Keller, with the marvelous 
language power that characterizes her to-day, is a 
concrete illustration of this message. Miss Sul- 
livan, the rare teacher of this rare soul, says : 
" Helen learned language by being brought in con- 
tact with living language itself, brought for the 
purpose of furnishing themes of thought and of 
filling her mind with beautiful pictures and inspir- 
ing ideals." She adds : " I have always observed 
that children invariably delight in lofty, poetic 
language, which we are too ready to think beyond 
their comprehension." 

How will these large conceptions of language 
and language teaching in the mind of the teacher 
be manifested in his work? First of all, in the 
selection, presentation, and further use of the ideals 
found in literature. 

Of himself, by his own observing, imaging, and 
thinking, the child learns many things about the 
world in which he lives ; he vaguely feels many of 



6 LANGUAGE TEACHING IN THE GRADES 

the truths of life ; he is even able to tell others 
much of what he sees. But in literature he finds 
the thought of those who have seen more, felt more 
deeply, and expressed themselves more effectively. 
Here he finds not only inspiration, but also models 
of form. 

Words have a marvelous power over the mind, 
and especially over the young mind ; it is peculiarly 
susceptible to suggestion. It is often said that " the 
child thinks by means of images." Words cause 
living pictures to glow on the sensitive film of his 
brain. But no two children respond to the same 
words with the same mental pictures ; not a child 
paints the exact picture in the mind of the speaker 
or writer. The result for each individual is a se- 
ries of pictures with familiar setting, suggested and 
colored by the word-picture of another. 

A " Eandom Memory " of Robert Louis Steven- 
son's forcibly illustrates the child's habit of weav- 
ing the web of a poem or a story into his own 
life: — 

" Rummaging in the dusty pigeonholes of memory, I 
came once upon a graphic version of the famous psalm 
' The Lord is my Shepherd ; ' and from the places em- 
ployed in its illustration, which are all in the neighbor- 
hood of the house then occupied by my father, I am 
able to date it before the seventh year of my age. The 
' pastures green ' were represented by a certain suburban 



ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON 7 

stubble field where I had once walked with my nurse 
under an autumnal sunset. . . . Here, in the fleecy per- 
son of the sheep, I seemed myself to follow something 
unseen, unrealized, and yet benignant ; and close by the 
sheep in which I was incarnated — as if for greater secu- 
rity — rustled the skirts of my nurse. ' Death's dark 
vale ' was a certain archway in the Warriston cemetery. 
. . . Here I beheld myself some paces ahead (seeing 
myself, I mean, from behind) utterly alone in that un- 
canny passage ; on the one side of me a rude, knobby 
shepherd's staff, on the other a rod like a billiard cue, 
appeared to accompany my progress ; the staff sturdily 
upright, the billiard cue inclined confidentially, like one 
whispering, toward my ear. I was aware — I will never 
tell you how — r that the presence of these articles afforded 
me encouragement. ... In this string of pictures I be- 
lieve the gist of the psalm to have consisted ; I believe 
it had no more to say to me ; and the result was consola- 
tory. I would go to sleep dwelling with restf ulness upon 
these images. ... I had already singled out one lovely 
verse — a scarce conscious joy in childhood, in age a 
companion thought : — 

In pastures green Thou leadest me 
The quiet waters by." 

The man who thus exquisitely repainted these 
pictures stored away in the " dusty pigeonholes of 
his memory," had three great gifts : vivid memories 
of childhood experiences, the heart of a child to 
interpret them, and the creative ability to bring 



8 LANGUAGE TEACHING IN THE GRADES 

them forth. He thus lays bare many universal 
feelings of childhood as he reads the emotions in 
his own soul. 

One of these feelings, — the quick response to 
the music and rhythm of words, — Stevenson re- 
calls as follows : " ' The Lord is gone up with a 
shout, and God with the sound of a trumpet ' 
rings still in my ears from my first childhood, and, 
perhaps, with something of my nurse's accent. 
There was possibly some sort of image written 
in my mind by these loud words, but I believe 
the words themselves were what I cherished. I 
must have been taught the love of beautiful sounds 
before I was breeched." The little girl who told 
of her love for " the singing sounds of the verses " 
in Longfellow's " Psalm of Life " and Words- 
worth's " Daffodils " said the same thing in another 
way. Both spoke for the child, as well as for a 
child. 

These memories of Stevenson's also suggest the 
grievous sins that have been committed against 
children, and, we might add, against literature. 
The so-called literature, rewritten, " written down " 
to the assumed mental level of the child, shows 
misunderstanding of the essential qualities of great 
literature and of the minds of children. The truth 
is that it is only the master mind that is great 
enough to touch the child heart. For real literature 



HOMER AND SHAKESPEARE 9 

expresses the soul of the writer ; and that soul is 
greatest which has " become as a child." This is 
not saying that all great literature is suitable nour- 
ishment for the young mind ; it is saying that all 
suitable literature for the young mind is great 
literature. It is the range, not the quality, of 
thought and emotion that is limited by experience. 

The literature that touches the heart of the child 
appeals to his imagination and stirs his emotions 
by suggesting and reviving his own experiences ; it 
appeals to his love of action. It must touch his 
loves, his hates, his aspirations, his fears, his joys, 
his griefs. It must penetrate his world of make- 
believe, and touch the every-day objects of the 
every-day world with the wand of fancy, — playing 
with their similarities and resemblances, — personi- 
fying sticks and stones, sun, moon, and stars, and 
even the phenomena and forces of nature. If things 
do not " come alive " in the outer world, they must 
be made alive in the inner world ; must " move 
about and do things." The richer the imagery, the 
more vivid the word painting, the greater his de- 
light. Surely these are characteristics of great 
literature ; of great poets and prose writers. 

Such names as Homer and Shakespeare suggest 
to many people a field of literature into which the 
young may not, cannot, enter. This belief is quite 
analogous to that of the child of the city slums, 



10 LANGUAGE TEACHING IN THE GRADES 

who " always thought grass was something to keep 
off of." Both misconceptions are pathetic. The 
children themselves, regardless of the false theories 
of their elders, have shown that Homer touches 
their heartstrings as does no modern writer of 
" stories and verses for the young." Hugh Miller, 
the man, writing of Hugh Miller, the boy under 
ten years of age, says : — 

" Old Homer wrote admirably for little folk, especially 
in the Odyssey ; a copy of which, ... in Pope's trans- 
lation, I found in the house of a neighbor. Next came 
the Iliad. . . . With what power and at how early an 
age, genius impresses ! I saw, even at this immature 
period, that no other writer could cast a javelin with 
half the force of Homer." 

To-day, in many primary schools, we find children 
entranced and their own lives lifted above the com- 
monplace by the stories of the old Greek heroes ; 
and in many a grammar school parts of translations 
of the Iliad and the Odyssey are read with keenest 
zest. 

The child, by no means ready for a play of 
Shakespeare's, listens with delight to such a burst 
of song as 

" Hark, hark ! the lark at heaven's gate sings, 
And Phcebus 'gins arise, 
His steeds to water at those springs 
On chaliced flowers that lies ; 



EDMUND SPENSER 11 

And winking Mary-buds begin 

To ope their golden eyes : 
With everything that pretty bin, 

My lady sweet, arise : 
Arise, arise." 

Must he wait until he can fully understand the sig- 
nificance of " chaliced " before he can see Phoebus 
arise to water his steeds ? see the " winking Mary- 
buds " " ope their golden eyes ? " Must he be de- 
prived of the pictures and the music because we do 
not nowadays say, " that pretty bin ? " 

Many another old English poet gives us gems of 
real child literature. Edmund Spenser may be 
quoted as an example. We find in his verse music, 
vivid word painting, color, rich imagery, personifi- 
cation, action, and the simplicity resulting from 
living close to Nature in loving intimacy. " We 
wander at will amidst this endless variety of inci- 
dent, of figures, all steeped in the colors of the 
imagination, without being reminded that there 
are bounds to the world we have entered," writes 
one who knows this poet well. True, the " Faerie 
Queene " as a whole is not for the grades ; but what 
of such extracts from it as the one given below ? 
This particular quotation is given because it has 
been so often happily used in the intermediate 
grades, with children from homes of all degrees of 
culture and from homes barren of all culture. 



12 LANGUAGE TEACHING IN THE GRADES 

" Then came the Autumn all in yellow clad, 
As though he joyed in his plenteous store, 
Laden with fruits that made him laugh, full glad 
That he had banished hunger . . . 

Upon his head a wreath, that was enrolled 
With ears of corn of every sort, he bore ; 
And in his hand a sickle he did hold, 
To reap the ripening fruits the earth had yold.*' 

One might write, " In autumn the earth looks 
yellow. It has brought forth ripened fruit and 
grain, and now we gather the harvest to keep us 
from getting hungry in the winter." There would 
then be no unfamiliar word, and the child would 
surely get the facts. But would we exchange the 
poet's beautiful word picture for this literal state- 
ment ? Both preserve the same familiar character- 
istics of autumn, — the ripened fruits, the vivid 
yellow coloring, the harvest ; — but the poet em- 
bodies them in a personified autumn, such as the 
child loves to picture ; and he feels the spirit of the 
season as a child feels it. 

Does any one believe that a child cannot image 
Spenser's Autumn and share his joyous spirit, 
because the words " clad," " laden," " enrolled," 
and " yold " are not in the every-day vocabulary ? 
The boy, Kobert Louis Stevenson, knew nothing 
of the theology of the Twenty-third Psalm, nor did 
he comprehend the exact meaning of many of its 



THE USES OF LITERATURE 13 

words. But " the result was consolatory ; " he 
went to sleep " dwelling with restfulness upon 
these images." The '' scarce conscious joy of child- 
hood " was a " companion thought of age." Does 
not many an adult who can explain the meanings 
of all the words, at least to his own satisfaction, 
possess less of the real meaning and spirit of the 
psalm ? 

Literature, as a basis of language training, has 
many uses besides the inspirational : it is a means 
of cultivating the ear ; of enriching the vocabulary ; 
of developing the feeling for a choice word, an apt 
phrase, and a well-constructed sentence. To at- 
tempt to limit the selections to the familiar vocab- 
ulary or the commonplace expressions would vio- 
late the principles of literature, of teaching, and of 
the nature of children. Even a certain quaintness 
of diction has a charm. For example, boys and 
girls of the intermediate grades delight in hearing 
selections from Lanier's " Malory's King Arthur " 
if the teacher reads them well. Such selections 
interpreted by a good reader add much to the ear 
training so essential to appreciation and good use 
of English. 

It may be well to emphasize here the importance of 
this special phase of language teaching. Much beau- 
tiful literature should come to the pupil through 
the ear. The words of many a poem should so 



14 LANGUAGE TEACHING IN THE GRADES 

sing themselves through the ear into the brain of 
the child that he shall hear in his heart both mes- 
sage and music " long after they are heard no more " 
by the outer ear. And so the teacher's reading of 
literature is necessarily an important factor of every 
phase of language teaching, including the teaching 
of oral reading. That it may be the best literature 
for the pupils at that time, it should be selected by 
one who has the wide knowledge of literature that 
is born of years of familiarity, and who has the 
sympathy with children that means loving insight. 
That it may make its deepest impression, the 
reader should fully appreciate its meaning and 
beauty, aud be able by his sympathetic reading to 
interpret that meaning and beauty to others. 

The following sketch of one teacher's happy and 
profitable use of " Snow-Bound " illustrates the 
points that have been made. It is typical of a set 
of more than a hundred such reports sent to the 
writer by as many teachers in third and fourth 
grades. This one came from a school where most 
of the pupils are the children of laboring men, 
many of them foreigners. The teacher wrote : — 

" I found the following to be the most successful plan of 
studying * small wholes ' from ' Snow-Bound : ' a short 
preparatory talk, then my reading the selection without 
comment, followed by general discussion with free ques- 



WHITTIER'S "SNOW-BOUND" 15 

tions ; then re-reading, the oftener the better. Some- 
times the children listened silently and drew the pic- 
tures. Lastly, they chose the lines they liked best and 
wanted to learn, and in that way we committed sixty 
lines. Here are a few of their comments : ' I like it 
because we used to live on a farm.' ' I like it because 
I have n't lived on a farm, and I 'd like to.' ' I like 
" Snow-Bound " because it seems so much like home 
and when we have storms.' 'I like where the old 
folks told them stories about when they were children.' 
' Where the mother was praying that no one should 
want for warmth and food.' 'The part where they 
were doing things and the mother was knitting and 
they were telling stories.' ' After the storm was over, 
where the boys went out and cut through the drifts to get 
to the barn.' ' Where the animals were mad because 
their breakfast was so long in coming to them.' One 
boy said, ' Seems as if I can't keep from saying " Snow- 
Bound " all the time.' 

Like Stevenson, these children used the reader's 
pictures to bring their own to light ; and then it 
became a pleasure to tell of their own home circle, 
their own home experiences, and of experiences 
they would like to have, and to memorize the 
beautiful, vivid pictures of the poet. They had 
something to say and were eager to say it, — the 
first two requisites of effective oral and written 
composition. 



16 LANGUAGE TEACHING IN THE GRADES 

Up to this point we have discussed only one 
manifestation of the large conception of the sig- 
nificance of language teaching, namely, the appre- 
ciation of the value of literature as a basis. Let us 
briefly consider a few other results. 

There will be respect for the individuality of the 
pupil. Though the teacher will kindle with the 
live coal and, later, trim the flame, he will keep his 
hands off and his tongue tied while each pupil tells 
of his own seeing, imaging, thinking, and feeling. 

There will be interest on the part of the pupil. 
Lack of interest in oral or written composition is a 
sign that the real boy or girl has not been touched. 
Any form of activity that expresses one's self is 
accon^panied by a sense of joy. 

There will be, also, recognition of the unity of 
the variously named lessons in the language group. 
In the schools of Germany the German language is 
studied as one subject, not cut up into sections. 
One finds on their schedules, — not literature, 
reading, rhetoric, language, spelling, — but Ger- 
man, which includes all these. It may not be a 
disadvantage to think of these recitations by their 
specific characters, but teacher and pupils should 
clearly recognize them all as only different phases 
of the study of English. 

The reading lesson should be a reading of litera- 
ture. It should furnish not only the inspiration, 



READING AND SPELLING 17 

but a part of the material for the language lesson. 
The reading and language periods may well be con- 
sidered as two halves of one whole. The personal 
thought and feeling stirred in the one should find 
opportunity for further expression in the other. 
While there can be no reading of literature with- 
out language training, there may well be a time 
known as the language period, so named because 
its specific purpose is effective use of language. 
By means of the reading lesson, completed by the 
language lesson, the child should not only grow in 
knowledge and appreciation of the best things 
written in English, but also in mastery of form and 
ability to speak and write more effectively. And 
the best forms of expression found in the reading 
lesson should be used as standards and models for 
the practice exercises needed. 

The spelling lessons should include the writing 
from dictation of sentences, stanzas, and paragraphs. 
These should be models of form : they should be 
related in thought to the other lessons of the lan- 
guage group ; they should be used to teach with 
spelling capitalization, and the character and use 
of punctuation marks; — in short, to teach ^ the 
mechanics of written language " and the correct 
spelling of words. These are never separated in 
use outside the schoolroom, and the habit should be 
formed of visualizing them in one picture. The 



18 LANGUAGE TEACHING IN THE GRADES 

lists of words, the sentences, the paragraphs, should 
all have direct bearing on both the thought and 
the form of the next oral or written composition. 

There will necessarily be recitation periods de- 
voted to class criticisms and corrections of dictation 
work and of oral and written composition. The 
standards must be usage of good writers. 

There should be drawing and constructive lessons 
also, given to illustrate and impress ideas that are 
suggested by the reading lesson and expressed in 
words in the language lesson. 

Such unity of purpose and plan in the treatment 
of the several subjects of the language group is 
dictated by good pedagogy — another name for 
common sense. 

There remain to be noted as necessary factors in 
language teaching, the exercises for gaining skill 
by repeated correct doing. To do this part of the 
work well, requires thorough, accurate, systematized 
knowledge of the use of forms ; it also requires 
careful planning to give the pupils the systematic 
practice needed. Nothing but persistent oral repe- 
tition of the correct form will overcome the habit 
of using incorrect, ungrammatical, and inelegant 
expressions in daily speech. These are matters 
of ear training and of motor habits, as well as of 
knowledge. As long as errors persist in a person's 
speech, they will persist in what he writes when 



DAILY PRACTICE 19 

full of his subject. The cure for such faults, then, 
whether of speech or writing, is in oral repetition. 
Exercises for this purpose should be conversational ; 
the more of a game element in them, the better ; 
they may, at times, be somewhat gymnastic in their 
nature. They should be short, lively, and practiced 
daily. 

But this habit of correct usage should be an in- 
creasingly intelligent usage. The following general 
plan for the daily practice exercises is recommended 
as sound in principle and serviceable in practice : 
(1) provide for exercises that require correct use 
of a form commonly misused ; (2) call attention to 
the form used and the manner of using it ; (3) se- 
cure repetition of the correct form; (4) ask pupils 
to tell what form has been used and how it was 
used ; (5) lead to a simple statement of a direction 
for its use; (6) require further repetition to fix 
habit. This plan may be followed in the study of 
written forms in the dictation exercises as well as 
with the oral exercises. 

To what extent shall technical grammar be 
called to our aid in teaching language ? 

In the primary grades the child is entirely en- 
gaged with the art, the using. There should be no 
thought of forcing upon him even the terms of the 
science. As his power increases and his study of 
language naturally and gradually deepens, he be- 



20 LANGUAGE TEACHING IN THE GRADES 

gins to appreciate a sentence as a thought unit ; 
he advances to the study of the larger elements of 
this thought unit ; and by the time he reaches the 
fifth or sixth grade he is ready to use intelligently 
the terms " subject " and " predicate." Similarly, 
his study of words is gradually giving him greater 
understanding of their various uses, and he begins 
to group them according to their uses in the sen- 
tence. When he understands that for which a term 
stands, he should use the term as naturally as he 
names the parts of a flower when he is familiar with 
those parts as special organs of the flower. There 
seems to be no halfway place for the home-made, 
makeshift word to be used as a substitute for the 
accepted term. For example, when the pupil has 
grouped the words used " to name," why belittle 
him by giving him a made-up word, while we re- 
serve the word " noun " for the next grade ? By 
the end of the fifth or the sixth grade, he should 
have grown to use intelligently the names of the 
parts of speech, as he uses any other words that 
have grown into his vocabulary in the natural way, 
— by use as needed to express ideas. 

But these terms are not taught as elements of 
the science, the logic, of Grammar. They have, 
rather, as his thinking and knowledge grew, been 
given to supply a needed, exact vocabulary. By 
means of its use he can much more clearly, simply, 



THE STUDY OF GRAMMAR 21 

and directly state the principal rules and directions 
governing the use of language forms ; and here, as 
everywhere else, clearer expression helps to clear 
the thought. Though the foundation is thus laid 
for the study of Grammar, it is not at this time 
for the sake of Grammar ; it is for the sake of its 
contribution to language power. 

When, by this gradual growth, — in thought, in 
vocabulary, and in appreciation of some of the 
underlying principles, — the time arrives for syste- 
matic study of the structure of the language, the 
study of English naturally divides into two lines : 
grammar, which is followed by the study of 
logic and other related subjects ; and literature and 
composition, which are to be a lifelong study and 
delight. But the analysis of thought required by 
an understanding of grammar as an organized 
body of principles is difficult for the immature and 
untrained mind. This branch of study should 
under no circumstances be attempted before the 
seventh grade, and it may well be deferred until 
the eighth ; and, in these grades, only the elements 
of the science can be studied with profit. 

A systematic, progressive course in English, from 
the kindergarten to and through the high school 
course, evidently demands the careful selection, 
collection, preparation, and arrangement of mate- 
rial, and the careful planning of exercises, that 



22 LANGUAGE TEACHING IN THE GRADES 

involve years of study and of time. It implies a 
series of text-books embodying the results of these 
years of experience. But with the best available 
series of books, much which only he can do remains 
to be done by each individual teacher. The books 
should suggest, inspire, give practical help, supply 
much material, and provide a consistently progres- 
sive plan of work ; but there always remains as the 
essential, the teacher's individual initiative and 
personal ability. 

Experience in all grades, both with and without 
text-books, has led to certain definite opinions re- 
garding the use of text-books by the pupils. It 
seems clear that during the first three or four years 
of school life the teacher is the best medium for 
presenting what is to be taught. Here, then, the 
teaching should be largely oral, and a formal text- 
book in the hands of the pupil may do more harm 
than good. The reading books should furnish 
much good material, and this may be supplemented 
by the use of pictures, blackboard, and chart. But 
in the intermediate and higher grades, assuming 
that the teachers have the requisite knowledge and 
experience, they have not the time to get and pre- 
pare the larger amount of material required ; nor 
should it be necessary for them to write so many 
lessons on the blackboard. Moreover, much of the 
best material is not at hand. 



L or c. 



SUMMARY 23 

Again, the pupil who has entered the fourth or 
the fifth grade has reached the age when he should 
think from the printed page ; when he should be 
held responsible for different lessons, to be thought 
out by and of himself. It is especially important 
in this study that he absorb much by reading and 
re-reading " to himself." It is the almost universal 
experience that when language work is attempted 
beyond the third or the fourth grade without books 
in the hands of the children, it tends to degenerate 
into a series of unrelated and more or less mechan- 
ical exercises. 

The principles presented in this paper may be 
summarized in a general plan of language teach- 
ing, as follows : — 

A group of language lessons related in thought: 

(i) Pupils reading^ and listening to the 
teacher's reading^ of something that has hoth in- 
terest and literary value ; 

(^) Thoughts and observations about the per- 
sonal observations and experiences suggested by 
the poem or story read ; 

(3^ Short daily conversation for the specific 
purpose of perfecting accuracy in the use of gram- 
matical forms and constructions ; 

(^) Dictation spelling lessons — daily exercises 
in copying and writing from dictation^ — of sen- 
tences^ stanzas^ and paragraphs^ in which special 



24 LANGUAGE TEACHING IN THE GRADES 

attention is giveii to the study and use of correct 
forms in sijelling^ capitalization^ punctuationy and 
arrangement ; 

(5) The final outcome^ — the flowering and fruit- 
age of the group of lessons, — the pupiVs telling or 
writing about something he himself has seen, done, 
heard, thought, felt, or imagined, suggested hy the 
poem or story ; 

(6^ H el] fid class criticisms and corrections. 
Alice Woodworth Cooley. 
University of North Dakota. ) 
January 7, 1905. > 



THE WEBSTER-COOLEY 
LANGUAGE SERIES 



A complete and successful course in English for 
intermediate, grammar, and high school grades by 
W. F. Webster and Alice Wood worth Cooley. 

FOR INTERMEDIATE GRADES 

Cooley's Language Lessons from Literature, Book 1, 45 cents 

Cooley 's Language Lessons from Literature, Book II, 65 cents 

Book II, also in two parts, each, 45 cents 

FOR GRAMMAR OR HIGH SCHOOL GRADES 

Webster's Elements of English Grammar 50 cents 

Webster's Elementary Composition 65 cents 

FOR HIGH SCHOOL GRADES 
Webster's English : Composition and Literature 90 cents 



Note : — Language Lessons from Literature, Book II, is 
planned to cover two years' work. For the convenience of 
schools which prefer a separate book for each grade, it is also 
published in two parts (as stated above) each covering a year's 
work. 



Correspondence with a view to examination and 
adoption of these books is solicited by the publishers. 



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